Last we heard, the AT&T Performing Arts Center still needed $40 million to finish its capital campaign and was trying to reduce a first-year operating deficit that had zoomed past $2 million. So, the news it released Monday afternoon fell into the category of Welcome Relief. The recent booking of the 25th anniversary production of the Broadway musical Les Misérables at the Winspear Opera House set revenue records. The center is calling it "the most successful two-week run in the 26-year history of Les Misérables anywhere in North America."

"This clearly establishes that the Winspear Opera House is a premier venue for presenting Broadway in North Texas and the United States," Mark Weinstein, president and CEO for the AT&T Performing Arts Center, said in a statement.

The final ticket tally for the 16 performances was $3.1 million, the center reports, "well exceeding the previous Dallas Broadway record of $2.3 million achieved by Mamma Mia! during its two-week engagement at the Fair Park Music Hall in 2006. On a national scale, the Dallas engagement surpassed a 2011 Les Misérables engagement in Denver by nearly $300,000. Sales figures are according to industry trade organization The Broadway League."

Weinstein attributed the record to three factors: Love for Les Miz; presenting the show over the holidays; and getting to see the show in the Winspear. The next show in the Lexus Broadway Series at the Winspear will be In the Heights from March 13 to March 25. Green Day's American Idiot will run from May 8 to May 20, and Jersey Boys (which previously played the Dallas Summer Musicals at the Music Hall at Fair Park) will take place from June 12 to July 15. The center also notes that its 2012-13 season will include the Tony Award-winning War Horse, which has since become a film by Steven Spielberg.